Changing the Meme

EDL demo, Leicester


Yesterday’s EDL demo in Leicester started me thinking about the English Defence League and what it has managed to achieve in just a little over a year. I’d like to offer some observations — and some constructive criticism — from an outsider’s perspective.

Richmond, North Yorkshire


Strictly speaking, I am only partially an outsider where England is concerned. A little over forty years ago I was not an outsider at all: I received my secondary education at a grammar school in Yorkshire, and spent my formative years in the lower Dales. By the time I left England and returned home, I had as deep an understanding of the country as an outsider is likely to get.

Reeth, North Yorkshire


So, although I understand England, it is an England of more than a generation ago, and I assume it has changed greatly in the interim. Recent visits to my old stomping grounds tell me that the small towns and rural areas of the West Riding are not all that different, but they are a long way (in culture, if not in miles) from Leeds, Bradford, Keighley, Birmingham, Luton, Tower Hamlets, and all the other inner city areas where immigration and Islamization have wrought their greatest changes.

Yet I am of the same generation as Pat Condell and Tony Blair, so I still experience a strong bond with the nook-shotten isle of Albion.

When I read the news accounts, watch the videos, and look at the photographs from the EDL demonstrations, I am aware of the class divisions that are evident in the clash between the EDL and the British establishment. My years in England gave me an intuitive understanding of the role class plays among the English. I developed an ear for the vowels and an eye for the dress and mannerisms that signaled a person’s class, and therefore the opportunities for and limitations on what he could achieve in life. An ambitious person of middle- or lower-class origin might apply himself for years in an attempt to erase those signifiers — and thereby incur the disdain of those he grew up with.

As an American in England, I was in a unique position: I was looked down upon and derided by all social classes. So I could learn about the culture as anthropologist would, without being fully part of it.

I went to school with middle-, lower middle-, and working-class kids. They never stopped making fun of me as a “bloody Yank”, but they got used to me, and some of them became my friends. From them I learned the ins and outs of the class system, at least as it manifested itself in the North of England.

As a result, when I look at the EDL demos, I can tell that the protesters are almost entirely working-class. When I hear them interviewed, the impression is confirmed. There is nothing at all wrong with this — these men and women from the despised proletariat are the heroes of the English resistance, and deserve our highest esteem — except for the fact that the movement will never succeed without a generous leavening of middle-class participants.

Mind you, the upper class does not have to be involved in order to guarantee success — the EDL can make it just fine without the toffs, thank you — but it desperately needs the middle class.

I spent yesterday thinking about all of this, and before I could put it together in an essay, some of our commenters on the three EDL posts weighed in on the same topic. I’ll lay out a selection of what they said before presenting my own conclusions.

First, a few comments from the “I am an Englishman” video clip, beginning with Homophobic Horse:

Is that supposed to be a parody? With the darkened lights, the grilled moonlit windows, the creepy icons of Enoch Powell, the actor with the mockney accent? What can I say, the whole thing is what it is: a liberal’s work of fiction.

A different take from imnokuffar:

I found this speech to be an accurate reflection of what I and many other English/British people think and feel.

Charles Martel came to a similar conclusion:

This was clearly a program meant to portray immigration restrictionists as the “lunatic fringe.” But, by golly, if they didn’t inadvertently provide us with a superb dramatic portrayal of what we all justifiably feel in our hearts.

The Sentinel disagrees with the “mockney” description:

This was very good – and as a Bermondsey boy myself, I can say this man was not a mockney.

All of these observations are quite accurate, despite the apparent contradictions. A good actor can successfully mimic any regional accent, given enough audio samples to work with. The fact that it was not his native dialect does not necessarily mark it as an inadequate simulacrum.

The same principle applies to the content of his monologue. In order for the drama to be at least superficially convincing, the screenwriters had to investigate and reproduce the real issues, as understood by the people who feel most strongly about them. That’s what makes the speech so inspiring for people like us, whose opinions already mirror those that the content-researchers so faithfully data-mined from internet archives, and then mimicked on the screen.

Make no mistake about it: this was an MSM production, and its target audience — politically correct middle- and upper middle-class British viewers — received it as intended, as a put-down of those benighted, atavistic, racist, nationalistic proles. The use of Enoch Powell as an iconic inspiration is proof of this fact — I remember quite clearly how Mr. Powell was reviled and ostracized for his “Rivers of Blood” speech. My cohort, the generation whose apparatchiks now control the levers of state, media, and social power, regard Enoch Powell as an emblem of racist fascism, a worthy heir to Sir Oswald Mosley.

But, as with so many MSM efforts, the real message gets through, despite the producers’ intentions. The writers, producers, actors, and target audience are deaf to the underlying significance behind what they portray, yet an ordinary Englishman experiences a thrill of recognition, and is heartened by it. The self-appointed guardians of multiculture may not realize it, but Enoch Powell is admired and respected by the EDL and other modern English nationalists. His presence in the TV program sends a totally different signal from what was intended.

Does this make this video clip “fake but accurate”? Perhaps.

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On yesterday’s EDL demo post, Zeke had this to say:

I went looking for better pictures and found them here. What is interesting is that it’s obvious that the photo editors wanted the pictures of bearded muslims carrying signs saying “Islam will rule the Earth” and “Sharia” and burning English flags, hidden at the end of a 50 slide show, well behind the bald headed white guys shoving the police.

This is quite correct. The truth of what the EDL is doing is all but impossible to convey via the MSM. The media will hide the vile behavior of Muslims, and will choose its sound bites from the EDL (or its UAF infiltrators, who provide the best material) in such a way that the “racist” and “fascist” meme will come through loud and clear to the intended audience.

If the EDL’s message is to be successfully spread, it must do so despite what the media oligarchs intend. It can sneak in through vehicles such as the “I am an Englishman” clip, or be conveyed via entirely different means, such as internet forums and social networking sites.

During the discussion about the Grauniad article, Ray Boyd observed:

What’s needed is a Political wing of the EDL fronted by well spoken people who will be able to appeal to the middle classes.

In 1990 I was part of the English anti-poll tax movement and although the MSM only ever highlighted the left wing thugs rioting in the streets there was a significant number of centre/right/conservative middle class people on the peaceful side of the movement.

We need these people now to assist the EDL on the perceived as “moderate” front because the MSM will always portray those EDL people who are brave enough to go on the streets as troublemakers.

This gets to the heart of the matter. The issue of class runs through all the coverage of the EDL, albeit in a subliminal fashion.

Look at the photos at the top of this post — what do you see?

The average American probably sees a street demonstration with a lot of police, and an unfortunate demonstrator who got beaned and is bleeding from the wound.

But the average middle-class Englishman — assuming that he has not yet awoken to the dangers of Islamization, and is therefore not one of “us” — sees an unruly mob of yobbos, exemplified by the punk who climbed the light pole to yell his defiance of the police. Mr. Englishman also notices that it requires a huge number of police to control the “fascist” thugs. And he sees a bleeding “skinhead”.

Since skinheads are known racists and proto-fascists, the average viewer probably thinks, “That yobbo got what was coming to him.”

This is the media meme. We have no hope of changing it directly. The media oligarchs, led by the Islamophiles of the BBC, will always make sure that the same pre-programmed message comes through. The EDL supporters have been massively infiltrated by their “anti-fascist” opponents (and for all we know, some of them may be MI5 plants), which guarantees that the worst possible behavior will be available, ready to be captured on camera and tape, to be presented on the evening news. Sieg-heil salutes, shouts of racist epithets, throwing bottles and bangers — all of this is available to the MSM for its propaganda, and any material that reflects well on the EDL and shows the protesters as good, decent, honest people is suppressed.

Skinheads have a long history in English popular culture. They first came into prominence in the sixties, when I lived in England. They were working-class yobs who were known back then as “Paki-bashers” and “bovver boys”. They liked to “put the boot in” and engage in “a bit of aggro”. Their shaved heads and big boots became the symbols of lower-class violence and intolerance.

This imagery still resonates with a middle-class English audience, especially those of my generation. They see those shaved heads on the streets, and they think of violent yobbos. It doesn’t make a bit of difference that this characterization is inaccurate and unfair — this is what is bound to come into the heads of the good burghers who believe most of what the television tells them.

The EDL can continue indefinitely with its current modus operandi. It can mount demonstrations in city centers and gather thousands of people to participate. The police will continue to impede the EDL supporters at every step, arresting them, denying them permits, and allowing Muslims and UAF thugs to beat them up with impunity. The Home Office will back up the police, and put up every possible political roadblock to the EDL to make sure that it cannot get its message through effectively and thus expand its base.

At bottom, this is a class issue. The EDL is suffering, and it will stagnate, due to the lack of a substantial, visible middle-class component. It can keep doing the same thing month after month, year after year, until twenty years from now when the Muslims outnumber the English, and then the war will be over.

To change the meme, both the composition and the strategy of the EDL need to change. The “skinhead” stereotype has to be retired — and I say this as an admirer of the EDL; I recognize that the poor fellow in the photo is one of the heroes of our time, as are all those brave souls who venture out into the mean streets to risk their lives and livelihood for the cause.

And I also say this as an outsider, as one who sees what is happening, but is not part of it. It allows me some insight, and gives me the opportunity to make constructive suggestions, even though I can’t make any direct difference to what is happening.

So what could be done differently?

Yes, the protesters could grow their hair out, but that would only be a superficial difference. What is needed is a visible presence of the middle class at EDL events.

I recognize that this suggestion will rub a lot of EDL supporters the wrong way. They have, after all, been kept down and marginalized for decades by the very people I propose they mix with. An enormous amount of contempt and dislike flows in both directions between the classes.

And yet it’s obvious that something of this sort is absolutely necessary for the English nationalist movement to succeed. If the social classes cannot put aside their differences, then the oligarchs and their Muslim Freikorps will easily carry the day.

Try to imagine a different scenario for an EDL street demo.

Imagine a city center in Leicester or Durham or Gloucester. Watch a peaceful and orderly crowd assemble — just as the EDL does now — but instead of the jeans and T-shirts and hoodies, we see a crowd of men with neatly cropped hair wearing business suits. The women are wearing dresses, or even skirts and jackets.

Everybody carries the same signs as they do now, and repeats the same slogans, but look at the difference in appearance. How will the BBC be able to play the “yobbo” and “skinhead” themes on the news that evening?

And then imagine an interview with one of the participants. He doesn’t have to sound like Lord Pearson or someone else from the aristocracy, but his vowels can reveal his middle-class origins.

How would ITN handle that?

Once again, I realize that these suggestions will grate on the sensibilities of many EDL supporters. Class resentment in England is still deep and wide.

But what if this is a necessity?

What if success cannot be accomplished without something similar to it?

Take another look at the “I am an Englishman” video. When the actor tells the audience that “we were never asked”, who were “they” who never did the asking?

The social context of the clip — the accent, the Bermondsey background, the use of Enoch Powell — convey the clear message that this is a conflict between the classes. “They” were the upper and upper middle classes, and they foisted upon “us”, the lower classes, the immigration which has destroyed us.

But this is not true. The meme is false.

Much of the destruction of modern Britain was carried out by the post-war Labour Party, many of whose leaders were thoroughly working class. It was a bolshie operation, and immigration was an integral part of the plan, because it helped destroy the “bourgeois” culture which they so detested.

The Marxist strategy has always been to destroy those things that the English nation — or any nation — holds dear. Tradition, custom, culture, religion, history, a distinctive language and dialect — all of these had to be deconstructed in order that the New Socialist Man could be constructed and usher in the Utopia.

Ummah Jack


This is what we are contending against. This strategy has played out very successfully for more than fifty years. Islam and dhimmitude are just the latest weapons to be deployed against the arch-enemy of the Left, which is Western Civilization itself.

To successfully combat the forces arrayed against them, Englishmen who love their nation will have to change this “class war” meme. They will have to put aside their resentments and anger, and recover their ancient dependence upon one another.

If they don’t change the meme, they will lose.

And England will cease to be.

45 thoughts on “Changing the Meme

  1. While I do respect the EDL and Tommy Robinson, they really do need to get better speakers, to present their case.

    The F Bombs (while I understand this is how Lower Class Brits talk), are off putting. Also he got into some imprecise language, when speaking off the hip about gangs and their aggression towards non Muslims and women, which could be construed and painted as classic bigotry.

    However he finished up strong in denouncing Nazis and inviting all stripes to join the movement against Islam…and defending CHRISTIAN British culture.

    This is my perception of his off the cuff remarks from yesterday, that I viewed at Vlads blog.

  2. Additionally, I do think that it is good that the EDL has members who can defend themselves from violent attacks, being that their are many rough and tough blokes in their ranks. It denies Muslim and Leftwing thugs monopoly ownership of the streets. This is an asset that is often missing from the Counter Jihad collective…and just in general from the Conservative Western political side. The Leftwingers and Muslims go unchallenged on Uni Campuses for example…as far as bringing people out in the streets, (who also present a credible threat of violence).

    This can be wielded in the same manner that Leftwingers and Muslims use it, to cajole governments and institutions to capitulate.

  3. Baron, I’ve put up an excerpt from this post and a link back to here over at Crusader Rabbit, under the heading “a brilliant, beautiful post”.
    And so it is.

  4. The class breakdown is different in the US, but the problem is the same- the people from the higher, or more powerful classes (which are not always higher) will never join us.

    Getting the upper-middle class to come over in America would obviously help, as would getting the middle class in Britain. But it won’t happen. We have to figure out a way to break the system on our own.

  5. The male EDL members should all dress like Ralph Nader, circa 1965.

    White shirts, black suits and ties.

    Women should wear modest business attire.

    It is always more off-putting to the middle-class to see people who look like them attacked and villified and beaten.

    You must play the media semiotic game to win over the mostly-indecisive public.

    This is a propaganda war as well as a cultural and literal war.

    Those who give their media enemies easily lampoonable images will be lampooned easily.

    At least make it hard on the MSM weasels.

  6. About the “Englishman” video:
    I am convinced that whoever wrote the speech intended it to come out as we are understanding it. Only the mainstreamers have brainwashed themselves so efficiently that they didn’t recognize it and let it slip through.

  7. “Houston, we’ve got a problem!”

    I’m afraid tht while the Engl. is pretty homogenous in the UK-i.e. if you have a mind to it, you could work together. Soooner or later, you’ll recognize you have a common enemy…even thugh your may be Irish and English. You’relll Europeans, Caucasians and christians.

    Over here in the U.S. we have a hodge podge.

    The Chicanos siding with the Mexicans, the Blacks and the Latinos from elsewhere pulling the other way, and the Asians – Japanese, Chinese, Flipinos, Koreans, whether born here or immigrants- if you talk to them, they will simply look at you with a puzzled look. With kno clue, whatsoever….

    All against the Whites.

    The only thing I think going for us, is that we’re all secular…thank God!

  8. Thank you for your perceptive thoughts on the EDL. If the EDL is largely a working-class movement it’s because that is the class that has, so far, suffered the most from immigration and Islamization. The flourishing working-class communities of many British towns and cities have been destroyed, and their churches and chapels converted to mosques.

    As Islam spreads from street to street and parish to parish, and as the middle classes find that their leafy suburbs are no protection against Islamization, perhaps your vision of middle-class involvement will materialize, if the middle classes haven’t by then thrown in the towel and fled abroad.

    My ideal scenario sees the British working class keeping the anti-Islam flame alight until the success of anti-Islam parties in Europe wakes the middle classes from their torpor.

    By the way, for all your readers bewildered by the British class system, it essentially boils down, as it does in every country, to two classes—the political élite and the people; them and us.

  9. Dear Baron, I am middle class and totally support the EDL. There are quite a number of us and we all play our part quietly.

    I read another post somewhere with someone saying the same thing: EDL need the middle-class.

    Now let’s see what happened the last time the middle class got involved in what was a working-class venture:

    The Manchester Guardian(and Labour Party).

    Both have become mouth-pieces for the ANTI-WORKING CLASS TOFFS!! The Guardian and BBC exist on a far-off planet, together with the ruling class. They are the ones forcing political correctness, anti-Jewishness, anti-working-class attitudes, through the education system and the media.

    People seem concerned with the spelling and grammar with which they express themselves: well thank the socialist middle-classes for forcing a diabolical school system on the working-classes!

    And I know because I was a teacher in state schools!

    So I reckon the EDL will do fine without any interference. After all, as a teacher, I discovered that intelligence is NOT class-bound!

  10. The EDL won’t get anywhere with the mainstream media in the UK. Look at the way Pamela Geller has been treated recently. And she’s a little lassie! What chance have a group of big strapping lads got? They’ll be portrayed as neo-Nazi thugs because that’s the narrative the mainstream media are (literally) hell bent on promoting. Turning up to an event with a ‘number one’ haircut and an England football strip on won’t help that situation one iota.

    Isn’t there something in ‘The Tipping Point’ about having key people on your side, who can make a huge difference to your project? That’s what the EDL need, I think.

    Not some anonymous maths teachers to walk alongside them at a march – the MSM will ignore their presence altogether. (Again, check out the way the MSM treated Pamela Geller’s march on 9/11.)

    No, the EDL need to get some key figures on board. Intellectuals, academics, authors, and yes, hopefully, journalists or columnists. Look how, whether they wanted it or not, Richard Dawkins and Chris Hitchens became the ‘face’ of atheism. If the media wanted someone to discuss the topic, they were their ‘go to’ guys. That’s what the EDL needs, I think, to crash them out of this endless loop of nonsense perpetuated by the mainstream media, and to have their message heard, loud and clear, throughout the UK.

    Candidates?

  11. An issue which the original poster doesn’t mention is the spectre of football hooliganism in England. That’s what people inevitably think about, when they see a photo like the young guy there with his head cut open. They automatically think, ‘He deserved it!’ It’s just a sad fact that in the UK, pictures of young guys with number one haircuts and England strips on, and/or waving England flags around, will always be associated with football gangs. And in the UK, given what’s happened in the past, that is definitely not a good thing.

  12. Nick —

    Yes, I see what you mean.

    During my time in England the football hooligans and the “bovver boys” were drawn from the same milieu. But the skinheads distinguished themselves by their Paki-bashing, and shaved their heads as a sign of that hobby.

  13. Juniper —

    Dear Baron, I am middle class and totally support the EDL. There are quite a number of us and we all play our part quietly.

    Yes, I know that. I even know a fair number of middle-class English EDL supporters. But there are so few of them that they are all but invisible at the demos.

    So I reckon the EDL will do fine without any interference.

    I don’t agree. I have been following the EDL’s events closely, and their progress has reached an obvious plateau.

    Each event is almost an exact carbon copy of the previous one –same tactics, same UAF/Muslim response, same media coverage.

    I don’t think they can get broad enough support to effect real change without extensive middle class involvement. That’s why I think it’s important to put aside the recriminations for what the middle/upper classes did to the working class — and they did, I’m not going to argue that they didn’t — and focus on English ethnic unity.

    Retaining the old class resentments is a recipe for destroying your country.

    As I said in the post, the working class deserves its share of the blame for the terrible destruction wrought by the Labour Party, many of whose members really were working class. I watched those TUC bastards at work while I lived in England, and I think they got even more malign in the ’70s.

    There’s plenty of blame to go around. But it’s time to remember what used to pull England together in its hour of danger, and draw on that well again.

    As I say, I remain an outsider. But outsiders can sometimes see things that the natives miss. And I see England destroying itself through a perverse inability to give up the class war.

    But then, I’m just a bloody Yank.

  14. This is a very important post. It’s important to brainstorm about strategy. Here’s my solution to how to change the image of the whole nationalist movement, not just the EDL. Most people here won’t like it, but here goes.

    When we talk about the mass media, who do we mean, and why are they against us? Well, one very significant factor here is gay people, who are influential in the media and education. They have good reason to fear nationalism, because so much nationalist rhetoric, so far, has been anti-gay and somewhat driven by religious fundamentalism.

    I think gay people (like Jews and women) are key to everything. A small group, yes, but influential, and their reasonable fear of the religious right’s homophobia is what keeps them stuck in the old paradigm of, we (gays, Jews, women, etc.) are an oppressed minority, therefore we have to stand with other minorities (Muslims, immigrants, etc.)

    In my conversations on this subject on other forums and real life, with members of these minorities, the minority solidarity meme always comes up. Most people in these groups hold to it like oxygen, although many others have outgrown it. I believe, if people on our side, including the religious right, could put aside their homophobic rhetoric, the gays in media would switch sides. Then no one would have to do this laborious outreach to the middle-classes, because the MSM would present our case.

    So how do we bell the cat of getting the homophobes and the gays on the same side? Talk about states rights and freedom of association. We must all agree that after we win, we’ll go our separate ways in our respective states, and stop interfering in each others’ lifestyles. Gay marriage and legal marijuana and abortion for my neighbors, and straight only marriage and illegal pot and abortion in other areas. We can all agree to keep the federal government out of these things. I only understand the situation in America, so I refer to that, but I assume the fear and snobbery of the Euro media has the same cause.

  15. Baron Bodissey: … I see England destroying itself through a perverse inability to give up the class war.

    Which makes me eternally grateful that America never had to go through any period of monarchic rule.

    While warrior kings may have had a valid role several centuries ago, having a royal class today more often means sustaining a parasitic and privileged body that does far more harm than good.

    Charles, Prince of Wales is the precise embodiment of how totally destructive Britain’s upper class has become. His osculation of Muslim arse is as shameful as it is vigorous.

    As for the article itself, I find little to argue with.

    Retaining the old class resentments is a recipe for destroying your country.

    Le bingo!

  16. latté island: I think gay people (like Jews and women) are key to everything.

    Good luck with that. Part of today’s gay movement involves the agenda of their more flamboyant participants. Pushing this agenda is a radical element that advocates elementary school curriculum like “Johnny Has Two Mommies” and what such.

    Attempting to drag what most consider to be adult level material in front of pre-teens has caused more than a few people to recalibrate their support of gay rights. I know because I am one of those people.

    Separating ostensibly moderate gays from their more radical faction will most likely pose the same sort of problems found with moderate and fundamentalist Muslims. The victim mentality − as you yourself noted − runs deep with both groups and is not going to be abandoned anytime soon.

    I agree that there needs to be a sharper focus drawn on individual rights and how Islam simultaneously tramples all of them. However, trying to get the Religious Right and gays singing off of the same page is going to be like herding cats.

  17. Zenster, it’s the opposite of herding cats. Cats are independent, most gays are obsessed with one or two issues. The reason they love the Democrats and won’t let go, is because the Dems give lip service to gay marriage and an end to don’t ask don’t tell. Any party that gives them that has them. Gays don’t have a political program, they’re addicts who need what they need, or they’ll be unhappy. I say this out of disappointment, not homophobia.

    But, this business of teaching gay stuff to schoolchildren isn’t part of the main program. They’ve only started obsessing about that because of the real issue of school bullying. I personally think teaching kids that they mustn’t bully gay kids will have the opposite effect, aside from the inappropriateness of adult material.

    But, regardless of how immature and shallow most gays are WRT politics, they are influential in the media, and if you give them those 2 issues, marriage and military service, they’ll flip so fast you won’t believe it.

    We’ll have gay sitcom writers making fun of Muslims, and hour-long tv dramas about honor killings. Plus, if we all think constantly of states rights and end up with that, the states can decide whether to impose the anti-bullying curriculum. (BTW, I voted against that when it came up in my town, even though I’m pro-gay. It’s easy to separate equal rights from the victim stuff.)

    Even though gays seem to have more official rights in Europe, the same cultural divide is on display. I wince every time a nationalist leader like Nick Griffin casually resorts to gay-bashing. Can’t they just stay on topic and try to have some class?

  18. latté island: … it’s the opposite of herding cats.

    I was referring to making an alignment of gay and religious right objectives. If that isn’t herding cats, I don’t know what is.

    The reason they love the Democrats and won’t let go, is because the Dems give lip service to gay marriage and an end to don’t ask don’t tell.

    The gay community’s alliance with America’s Democratic Party may well end up costing them their lives. Liberalism’s sheltering of Muslims may just as quickly bring about gay-bashing on a scale heretofore unseen.

    As always, the irony of how Conservative values protect individual rights far better goes unnoticed by gays.

    We’ll have gay sitcom writers making fun of Muslims, and hour-long tv dramas about honor killings.

    If gays have any brains, they’ll start doing this now and not as some quid pro quo for ending “don’t ask, don’t tell” or gay marriage. The longer that gays in the media industry withhold their scorn for Islam, the more likely it is that such silence will be their undoing.

    This article in tonight’s news feed about how “Gay-Bashers Thrive in Modern-Day Netherlands” should be cause for major alarm. If gays doubt this, they should try showing up in drag for the Dearborn Islamic festival. Muslim oppression of gays is not exclusive to Holland and Liberals are among some of the greatest enablers of gay hatred there are.

    Either the gay community purchases a clue or they will be Islamic roadkill right alongside the Jews. Time is running out for professional victims of all stripes. The most expert and practiced victims have come to town and they will brook no competition from the infidels.

  19. I made my previous comments before I saw the Ezra Levant article on Muslim gay-bashing in the Netherlands. This is the type of story that will flip the majority of gay people. The gay leadership will be the very last to let go, but the ordinary people will learn to fear Muslims more than they fear the Religious Right. So, the Religious Right doesn’t have to do anything to win over gay people.

    But, I do have to emphasize that their everyday anti-gay rhetoric, often so casual and out of context, as is occasionally on display even on this forum, is a major cause of the gay clinging to leftism. If only the Religious Right would stop it. We’re discussing our image problem on this post, and nothing makes someone look more like a yob than if they obsess about gays as much as some people obsess about the Jews. Personally, I think gay marriage and military service are trivial. I support it but I don’t care much. Why does everyone care so much? If the Religious Right would just get off it and stop funding anti-gay initiatives where they don’t even live (i.e., they don’t respect states rights) gay people would have flipped a long time ago, and we would have those anti-sharia tv shows. No need to dress up at the demos, gay media moguls like Barry Diller, and all his minions in movies and tv, will do all the work for us. Ditto for the BBC. Guaranteed. This is the most important thing I can possibly say, and unfortunately, some people are so attached to the gays are sinners/going to hell/ruining civilization meme, they’d rather lose the war than make common cause with people who, as much as Jews, create popular culture.

  20. So what do we see as a result of all revolutions,the proles win it and the bourgeoise sell it back to those that were “removed”because they,the proles do not regard themselves as intelligent enough to conduct the affairs of a nation,and once again the aspirations of the ordinary people are ignored and forgotten.We must break this vicious circle for once the bourgeoise gain any semblance of control they will assuredly subvert the will of the people,the people themselves must become managers and run the system for thier own benefit.As for peacefull demonstrations,will the muslims leave,or the administration hand the people power ,peacefully?

  21. Is the big photo Barnard Castle? The smaller one looks like Reeth or Leyburn maybe? Glad to know we have more than philosophy in common Baron – Sulber Nick provides a clue.

  22. @Baron

    I was born in Leeds and left for the south at 16. you are certainly in a position to have a good understanding of England having attended a grammar school in Yorkshire.

    I believe the BNP is a busted flush because if they recover from their current troubles even under a different leadership they are still the BNP and will always be lambasted by the MSM and establishment.

    The EDL are not quite in that position – at least not with the public – but they do urgently need middle class involvement before they are in the same situation as the BNP.

    The middle class are aware of the problem with Islam but not as concerned as they should be because the problem is not in their back yard.

    I mentioned the anti poll tax movement in an earlier comment when I said the middle class – and I was one of them – became very active and that was because they were directly affected.

    I organised a demo in Plymouth and got 20,000 people on the streets. because I was middle class I organised car stickers, tee shirts with anti-poll tax slogans, arranged publicity with the TV stations and even got our demo on the main national BBC news even though there were demo’s all over the country that day. I had to work hard for that.

    The left hated me because I was successful and accused me of being in it for the money – it actually cost me money.

    So, this is what is needed for the EDL before it’s too late and they have been tarred with the same brush as the BNP.

  23. Sigh. Since many of you are not from England, let me tell you the basic rule: the middle class fear and despise the working class. I don’t know one middle-class socialist who has a single non-white friend, or a single working-class friend. As socialists they are more like christian missionaries, who see it as their job to lead this “lesser species of humanity”.

    EDL does have middle class people involved. Some of the speeches have been written by middle class people, some middle class people have given speeches. There has been a Jewish Division of EDL since May, and it’s received almost no media attention. There’s been a Gay Division of EDL since March, and it’s received NO media attention. Even travelling video shots along a demo have been edited to hide any evidence of the gay signs and flags at the demo. The media are positioning the EDL where they are IN ORDER to prevent middle-class people from joining.

    It wouldn’t matter if middle-class people give speeches – when you see the speeches around the internet, what you don’t see is them being shown on TV. The supposedly independent 4th Estate are in fact the mouthpiece of the government.

    I believe the EDL knows this, and I believe it explains the EDL’s strategy of taking the demo to town after town after town. They know that fundamdentally the only way to by-pass the most extraordinary media propaganda outside of war-time, is to build up from the grass roots. And at the grass roots, this country is at least 60 or 70 per cent working class.

    What most middle-class people are doing is white-flight. They are moving out of the cities into small towns, rather than face going to the police to complain about the gangs of muslims who attack them when out with their small children in the park. I know people who have done precisely this – they have been so well-conditioned by fear of the charge of “racist” they will not even utter among friends and family what has driven them from the city.

    On to the subject of skinheads. The skinheads you describe are a marginal sub-species of skinhead. In the 1990s that image became fashionable with homosexuals here. Consequently, the image went from being scary to laughable. Most of the dangerous racists in Britain no longer dress like that. The media can still use the imagery along with phrases such as “X and Y demos ended in violence” to bring forward the memory people have of skinheads from the 1970s and 1980s.

    The media misrepresentation of the risk of being a victim of violence on these demo is astonishing. For example, I was advised by friends and family to wear a stab vest for my first demo. I’m glad I didn’t buy one, because it would have been a waste of money. In 8 demos I’ve not been closer than 50 feet to any violence. I probably would get more benefit wearing a stab vest coming home from work at night.

    All of that is done to keep the middle class away.

  24. Sigh. Since many of you are not from England, let me tell you the basic rule: the middle class fear and despise the working class. I don’t know one middle-class socialist who has a single non-white friend, or a single working-class friend. As socialists they are more like christian missionaries, who see it as their job to lead this “lesser species of humanity”.

    EDL does have middle class people involved. Some of the speeches have been written by middle class people, some middle class people have given speeches. There has been a Jewish Division of EDL since May, and it’s received almost no media attention. There’s been a Gay Division of EDL since March, and it’s received NO media attention. Even travelling video shots along a demo have been edited to hide any evidence of the gay signs and flags at the demo. The media are positioning the EDL where they are IN ORDER to prevent middle-class people from joining.

    It wouldn’t matter if middle-class people give speeches – when you see the speeches around the internet, what you don’t see is them being shown on TV. The supposedly independent 4th Estate are in fact the mouthpiece of the government.

    I believe the EDL knows this, and I believe it explains the EDL’s strategy of taking the demo to town after town after town. They know that fundamdentally the only way to by-pass the most extraordinary media propaganda outside of war-time, is to build up from the grass roots. And at the grass roots, this country is at least 60 or 70 per cent working class.

    What most middle-class people are doing is white-flight. They are moving out of the cities into small towns, rather than face going to the police to complain about the gangs of muslims who attack them when out with their small children in the park. I know people who have done precisely this – they have been so well-conditioned by fear of the charge of “racist” they will not even utter among friends and family what has driven them from the city.

    On to the subject of skinheads. The skinheads you describe are a marginal sub-species of skinhead. In the 1990s that image became fashionable with homosexuals here. Consequently, the image went from being scary to laughable. Most of the dangerous racists in Britain no longer dress like that. The media can still use the imagery along with phrases such as “X and Y demos ended in violence” to bring forward the memory people have of skinheads from the 1970s and 1980s.

    Even if a demo had no “skinheads” on it, the media would use “library pictures” to lie. Sky News this weekend claimed their newsvan had been attacked. But showed no evidence. Video taken from above showed the lie, and they have been exposed.

    The EDL is not a right-wing organisation, and the bulk of the EDL seem to be supportive of gay rights.

  25. Apologies for the dual post. On submission each time I was returned a (useless) error page, telling me the the URL was too large.

    So I went back to reduce the size of my comment, and re-submitted, only to be given the same error.

    I’d given up. But then when I checked my email account I could see both comments had been posted.

    Please delete one to give people less verbiage and deja vu.

  26. This was a very perceptive post and it’s very useful to see ourselves as others see us. I was a grammar school boy in the Fifties. In our midland school, I never quite picked up the intensity of the class attitudes mentioned here – but it was a very aspirational/inspirational school which sent quite a high proportion of its sixth form (of all backgrounds) to Oxford and Cambridge.

    The middle classes today can afford to be “liberal” about immigration and Islam. They generally only meet the professional members of the immigrant communities – unless perhaps they also hire a domestic cleaner from there at a thrifty wage.

    The state however, is equally suspicious of us older, middle England types. We held a very polite demonstration outside the offices of the Liberal Democrat party on the day their members in the House of Lords ratted on the promise of a referendum on the Lisbon treaty. There were not more than seventy of us at most and prior permission had been obtained (as is now legally required).

    The Metropolitan Police sent three officers, armed with machine guns to keep us in order. Two of our members, who were veterans wearing their medals and regimental and regimental blazers, went up to these officers very quietly and politely. They asked “Will you fire on us, if you are ordered?”. Two officers said “No” straight away. The other looked awkward. It’s him I’m bothered about.

    This may have a strong class aspect but the underlying conflict is the nation against the political (and politically correct) class.

  27. Sulber Nick —

    That’s the market square in Richmond, North Yorkshire, taken from in front of a hairdressing salon.

    There is a castle off to the right, but not in the picture. I couldn’t get a good photo from outside the perimeter wall, and I wasn’t willing to pay the 9 quid or whatever it was to get into the castle grounds.

    And yes, the other one is Reeth. Good call.

    If you point your mouse at each photo for a second, you’ll see the label telling you those things. I always label my images with an identifier.

  28. James —

    Most of the dangerous racists in Britain no longer dress like that. The media can still use the imagery along with phrases such as “X and Y demos ended in violence” to bring forward the memory people have of skinheads from the 1970s and 1980s.

    Prescisely my point. Hence the need to dump the skinhead look.

    There’s no possibility of making the media change the way they portray the EDL — they’ve made their decision about what the EDL are, and will stick to it to the bitter end — but the EDL could make it very, very difficult for them to be successful in their lies.

    The idea is to force the BBC to give up reporting on the EDL at all if they want to continue with the “EDL are working-class fascists” meme.

    Hence my idea that ALL demonstrators wear business suits. If that happened, the BBC would have to resort to archival footage to run a story about the demo on the evening news.

  29. get Peter Tatchill on board< hes stood up for gay rights in the mme ffs. he gets media like flies around shites! also try Rod Liddle hes good< get these 2 to come to divisional meetings, Peter to the lgbt ones lesbien,gay,bisexual and transgender). and Liddle to a straight one. just a thought about getting the middle classes on board.

  30. Several thoughts on several of the matters raised above:

    – Not all Of the Middle Class are Socialist. Indeed indications are that a majority are centre or centre right and many of those I speak to are rapidly becoming disillusioned with the new centrist administration and moving to the right, particularly on the matter of our ethnic cleansing.
    – “A plague on their (political) houses!” is phrase I hear more and more frequently albeit expressed in variety of different ways, with different emphasis dependent upon the speaker’s proximity to the occupied territories.
    – When I raise previously forbidden subjects with them I am, as opposed, say, to five years ago, getting answers, either verbal or visual that could equally well have from a member of the EDL.
    – As to whom could communicate across this narrowing boundary, I would suggest it is going to have someone somewhat older then the baby boomer generation, someone who was born and brought up in the working class and who has over the years since made the transition to middle class.
    – Obvious candidates would be Grammar ‘Schoolers’ who were equipped to make this cross-class move before the political classes shafted our education system in order to reduce everyone to the lowest common denominator and thus closed the door of opportunity to later generations.
    – Believe you me they know their roots, why and where they are now and what they are going to have to do pass this on to their children.
    – It is not a matter of whether this can be done, it must be done, and soon.

    Seneca III

  31. @ Baron Bodissey and Zenster—Retaining the old class resentments is a recipe for destroying your country.

    Germany is destroying herself through Islamization just as effectively as England, and the same is true of any number of modern, classless European republics.

    Throughout Europe, the villains are to be found in one particular class: the ruling class.

  32. Very interesting thread. In my opinion this is a conversation that needs to be had.

    I think we’re all past the ‘Who was flying those planes? Islamic terrorists? What’s that?’ stage by now.

    The enemy we face is those people within our own borders who are, and I’ll use the term again, hell-bent on promoting Islam, and simultaneously destroying our own culture. The mainstream media is one arm of this beast. As others have pointed out, they have decided upon a narrative and we can’t expect them to have some sort of revelation and change their ways. That’s not going to happen – at least not as things stand right now.

    The EDL could make it difficult for the mainstream media though, by providing them with no ‘skinhead/football hooligan’ images whatsoever. The mainstream media are mentioning certain websites as sources of information – including the EDL’s own. Yet they’re not mentioning the way that the EDL support Israel, or the way some Israelis support the EDL. Put that on the front page of the websites mentioned in the mainstream media then. So although the journalist responsible for the article won’t say it, they will in actual fact be pointing towards those associations. At least some of the article’s readers then, will be exposed to those associations, and who knows, they may think ‘Hold on, that’s not what I expected to see on here!’ and (you never know) look at any more articles written by the same paper in a different light.

    They may even think: I can see for myself that they’re witholding important facts from me. Why would they do that?

    So that’s two things that could be worked on, I think. 1) Work hard to minimise the chances of anyone getting photos at an EDL event that could be used to promote the mainstream media’s narrative about the EDL. 2) Put the ‘diversity’ angle front and centre on the websites mentioned in MSM articles.

    Getting one or two prominent people on board could be immensely beneficial as well. (As the new post about Islam in Germay points out, if a respected journalist turns away from the narrative being promoted by the mainstream media, and starts telling the truth, that can be something of a game changer. Easier said than done, I know. Still …

  33. An interesting analysis. I am highly suspicious of the EDL and thier works. So far what have they achieved other than the further demonisation of the anti-islamist movement. The power of the MSM is precisely that they can portray this movement anyway they like and the EDL plays right into thier hands. I also think it is riddled with agents of the state, has no clear agenda, has no political voice, does not fight elections and that it is a fashion, not a movement. In short, apart from soundbites and and appeal for all sections of the “community” to fight Islamism and an appeal to “Moderate Muslims” to rise up and join them – how many times have we heard that, it is a ragbag of ideas held together with an elastoplast.

    The BNP is not a “busted flush” it actually has 2 MEPs, Council seats and a (admittedly) incompetent, London council member. It actually does and has been doing what this EDL lot could never do.

    What do you suppose the ultimate aim of the EDL is – exactly ?

    The notion that a bunch of middle class people are going to transform this ragbag of edealist,incompetents who play into the hands of the MSM every time they open thier rather large cakeholes is as laughable as it is incoherent.

    Oh, yes I am a BNP member, working class and University educated. I don’t think we need a lot of middle class people telling us what to do and think. We have had enough of that already.

    We prefer to think for ourselves and sort out our problems our own way.Without the advice of others.

    And we have rather a lot of Middle Class people in our ranks.

  34. @imnokuffar

    when I said the BNP is a busted flush I meant that as long as they are called the BNP they will always be lambasted by the MSM.

    Having donated to them I have been a supporter but I am dismayed by their current infighting.

    It may be too late for the EDL to shake off it’s negative image but as anti islamic parties grow in Europe maybe they’ll take on here too.

  35. I think that some of the comments made earlier about the EDL ring true. I spent some time on the EDL forum, and was even approached by one of their top guys to write for them. However I fell foul of the EDL for asking questions about what they were doing.

    There were several people who frequented their website, for example, who spent their time attacking authors like Bruce Bawer and Robert Spencer. This is the EDL website, I thought. Why are people being told not to read books by Bruce Bawer and Robert Spencer? Very strange.

    I also questioned them about their apparent obsession with being seen to recruit ‘moderate Muslims’?

    Chasing after a chimera didn’t seem to be a productive use of EDL resources to me.

    I was eventually banned from the EDL for asking about these issues, and for promoting the work of Bawer and Spencer. Well done the EDL, eh? What are they trying to do again – really? Only they know the answer to that.

    Then again, maybe they don’t.

  36. I can see some here are fearful of middle class involvement in the EDL (and others of the EDL itself) and I can understand that entirely;l however it rests on the false assumption that “the middle class” is one big, undifferentiated lump. It certainly isn’t that. What most people perceive as middle class is actually just a highly visible media creation, the “middle class” the home counties and other posh bits (like parts of Cheshire, where they always drive the latest Range Rover and attend charity dinners where they raffle trips on champagne-flooded boats for more money the GDP of a large pacific island).

    To say that the EDL doesn’t need or want the middle class involved is right, to the degree that their understanding of what it means to be “middle class” is very narrow and limited. It might be better to say that they don’t want the media class involved rather than the middle class – in BBC parlance the media class and the middle class are one and the same, but in the real world the middle class is mostly hard-working and industrious, as opposed to the parasitic media class that the BBC is comprised of, and paradoxically despises.

    And this is entirely separate from the non-national political class that has emerged in the last 20 years. All the office workers employed by local government form a not insignificant constituency all of their own and they are firmly in the pro-multiculti camp.

    Apologies if this is a little rambling, I’ve just got back from doing some building work in Romania and most of today has been pretty hazy at the best of times.

  37. Seems to me that the EDL has a lot in common with the Tea Party movement in the US. The Tea Party is often vilified and demonized as being a bunch of “bitter clingers” and “racists” and “homophobes” and so forth, regardless of the abundant evidence to the contrary. But then, the media and the left-wing government no longer monopolize the means of communications.

    The Muslim activists themselves are doing more to educate the public about the evils of Islam than their opponents could ever do.

    We in the Tea Party, the EDL, the SIOE/SIOA, the blogosphere, and elsewhere just need to keep plugging along and doing the best we can; the Lord will take care of the rest.

  38. Naw, the Tea Party is a broader coalition of society.

    I still think that the EDL needs better speeches than the ad hoc one that Tommy Robinson gave at Leicester. The one by former UK military officer that I saw earlier this year or last year was much better.

    It’s OK that EDL remains mostly lower class. They provide a valuable asset that other Anti Islam groups dont have, and that is a muscular street presence. They wont let the Muslims and Leftwingers control the streets anymore. There youth and physical prowess and roudiness are an asset that can be useful to the broader coalition movement.

  39. EscapeVelocity: They [the EDL] provide a valuable asset that other Anti Islam groups dont have, and that is a muscular street presence.

    As the counter-jihad moves forward, I think there will come a growing appreciation for this. Witness the ANTIFA violence in Sweden and elsewhere and then consider the upshot if those buggers had to limp back home on crutches.

    As always, it would be best if no violence at all was needed. At the same time, ANTIFA and their pet Muslim thugs literally demand to be repaid in their own coin. This is especially so in light of how law enforcement routinely abdicates its role in assuring public order, if not serving as an outright accomplice to Islamic interests.

    If the Left has no problem “breaking a few eggs”, it’s time for the coop to raise a ruckus.

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